Voting Rights and Suffrage/Culture and Politics/Polling

Voting Rights and Suffrage

Does public polling reveal insights about the right as experienced in different countries?

Electoral Rights and Europe

Being a part of the European Union, a citizen of a European country has electoral power in European, national, regional, and municipal levels, though that can bring confusion as to whether or not a European citizen can participate in all of the elections of a particular EU country. EU citizens can vote for European Parliament and municipal elections in any EU country that they live in, though they cannot vote in elections for national parliament nor in regional elections ('Flash Eurobarometer 485 - European Union Citizenship and Democracy', 2020, p. 3).

According to the Flash Eurobarometer 485 of July 2020, 71% European citizens were aware that a citizen of the EU that lives in their country has the right to vote for European Parliament (p. 5). 53% correctly stated that it is false that EU citizens living in their country can vote for national elections. A similar fifty percent split was found with European citizen’s belief of whether other EU citizens not from their country could vote for municipal and regional elections (p. 5).

This data implies that most Europeans recognize their own and others’ right to vote, and that their voting is done in conjunction with European voters from different countries and cultures. This creates an experience of voting that is decidedly international, both in the power that a European has with their vote and also the effects they feel from the votes of others. Voting power is much more expansive than just their own locality, and is instead affecting a much larger trans-national federation.

Later in the report, it shows that 63% of Europeans believe that a citizen of the US is justified in having the right to vote in the national elections of the country that the foreign citizen resides in (p. 6). The countries with the highest number of citizens who thought it justified was Ireland with 77% and Portugal with 74%. The lowest was Denmark with 40% and Sweden with 35%.

With the countries with more citizens that believe it is justified like Portugal and Ireland, the data implies that the right to vote should be expansive and farther reaching, with less importance placed on nationality and more on where someone lives. Moreover, the citizen’s desire for a wider net of participation implies an experience of voting that is too restricted, and far away from being universal.

With countries on the lower end with citizens that believe it to not be justified like Denmark and Sweden, the data implies that their conception of the right to vote is one that should be kept close with the ethnic and cultural natives of the country. The electoral net is too wide, and there would be a greater benefit if voting access were to be restrained and more controlled. This is further supported by the report later on which states that 49% of Danes and 56% of Swedes (the highest percentage) believe that European citizens should only vote in their country of origin (p. 21).

Encouraging Others to Vote

The World Values Survey in their 2020 report asked more than 70,000 citizens from 50 countries about what political activism they would consider taking, particularly whether they would encourage others they know to vote in an election. The results: 22% said they have encouraged others to vote 26% said they might encourage others to vote 48% said they would never encourage others to vote ('World Values Survey Wave 7', 2017, p. 333). The countries with the highest percentage of those that have encouraged others were Germany with 64%, the United States with 63%, and New Zealand with 62%. The countries with the highest percentage of those that would never encourage others were Myanmar with 79%, Ethiopia and Kyrgyzstan with 76%, and Jordan with 69% (p. 333).

For the countries like Germany and New Zealand with a high percentage of vote encouragers, the act of voting is likely experienced as an important, effective, and social phenomenon where political accomplishments can be reached if there is enough support. Voting is a statement made about the beliefs a citizen has over the contemporary political process, and pride is taken in its expression and public participation. The right to vote is something citizens should both have and take advantage of.

For the countries like Myanmar and Ethiopia with a high percentage of “never encourage” voters, their experience of voting is likely one where voting is unimportant and ineffective, and as a result is either a private or non-existent affair. Likely, the experience of voting is one of pessimism and disillusionment. The political goals of the public are not taken into account and the act of voting is political theater. On the other hand, it is possible also that voting is actively discouraged in these countries in order to uphold the current status quo, and in that case the right to vote is seen as a threat to established power.